Seriously?
"Migrant laborers are Tajikistan’s top export. In 2019, the remittances they sent from Russia exceeded $2.6 billion – about triple the value of all other Tajik exports that year combined, and equivalent to approximately 28 percent of Tajikistan’s GDP." [0]
"According to figures provided by the Interior Ministry of the Russian Federation, more than 3 million Tajik citizens were officially registered in Russia last year. In 2021, 2,439,198 Tajik nationals reportedly stated “work” as their reason for entering Russia; that is about one-quarter of Tajikistan’s entire population." [1]
[0] https://eurasianet.org/tajik-labor-migration-to-russia-hits-...
[1] https://asiaplustj.info/en/news/tajikistan/society/20220214/...
This is a pretty common pattern: there's a portion of the population that is mobile and can freely move around, and the rest of the population is stuck in place for one reason or another. When Venezuela went through its instability a couple years ago, about 20-30% of the population left [0]. Syria had 30-40% leave [1]. Ukraine had about 15% leave the country, but more were displaced from the warzone as internal refugees.
So when you say that "about one-quarter of Tajikistan's entire population" went to Russia for work, that suggests that economic conditions are at the same general class as 2018 Venezuela or 2012 Syria, where everybody who easily can move has moved. The people that are left really do have nowhere else to go.
[0]: https://www.iom.int/venezuelan-refugee-and-migrant-crisis [1]: https://www.unrefugees.org/news/syria-refugee-crisis-explain...
>they depend on others’ charity
It's called family.
> In 2014, Tajikistan was the most-remittance based economy on earth, amounting to almost half of its GDP. The countryside is dotted with half-finished concrete homes which I was told were the long-term retirement plans of Tajiks working abroad; they build their structures for a few months each year over many years or decades using trickles of funds earned from abroad. When the structures are finished, they prepare them to be their permanent homes once they retire from migrant work.
They aren't settling out of the country permanently and I doubt the quality of life as a migrant worker in Russia is spectacular.
"174,000 Tajiks became citizens of Russia in 2022, up from 104,000 the year before." [0]
That's 1.5% of Tajikistan's population in a single year. We are not building walls, you know.
[0] https://eurasianet.org/number-of-tajiks-seeking-to-get-russi...
> Anecdotal evidence suggests that recent recipients of that status have been prioritized for military mobilization as the Kremlin forges ahead with its offensives against Ukraine.
"While Tajik expatriates have some scant freedom of movement and residency privileges in Russia as compared to peers from most of the world outside the former Soviet Union, they have limited access to accommodation and credit, making settling long-term a complicated proposition.
Migrant laborers also face recurrent costs like payment for their work permits.
Holding Russian citizenship makes many problems go away."
"Anecdotal evidence"
Exactly.
There’s a reason most rich people stick to developed countries.
National university professor's family (so, upper middle class) living behind 3m concrete walls topped with broken glass and shuttling between there and similarly armored swim clubs.
It made me reflect on the difference between token security and actual security.
Money matters, but so does muscle.
based on the pics in the article, it seems pretty similar to Himalayan regions of Pakistan, India, Nepal. What was so special?
poor countries just shift that number lower. but if I had $100MM I'd rather be sorta-rich in Los Angeles than mega-rich in Bolivia
but worse case for violent criminal things, there isn't a functional difference between a campaign donation to the district attorney in a wealthy nation or a couple bucks to a police officer in your face in a poor country
> openly racist towards ethnic Tajiks
Makes me wonder, maybe something happened between ethnic Tajiks and ethnic Russians between Soviet Union collapse and the present.
Probably the various ethnic cleansings that happened in the *stans at the fall of the USSR, where most more western ethnicities (Russians, Ukrainians, Belarussians, Armenians, ...) were at best swiftly & firmly reconducted to the nearest airport, and at worst killed on the spot.
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grigory_Zass
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Sea_slave_trade#Circassi...
I get the impression that this might come as a surprise to you: 'In the context of the Circassian slave trade, the term Circassians did not necessarily refer to ethnic Circassians, but was used as an umbrella term for a number of different ethnicities from the Caucasus region, such as Georgians, Adyge and Abkhazians, in the same fashion as the term "Abbyssinians" was used as a term also for African slaves who were not from Abyssinia.'
That Moscow is a european colonial project was kind of my point but obviously that flew at a level seemingly mesospheric to you.
And guess what? My country (America) had their own colonial project around that same time period (and also conflated various native groups) - like, ever heard of Manifest Destiny?
You describe 1863 as ancient history, so I'm not keen on putting any trust into the words you're using or claims to being educated on the subject.
Not sure why that would make me empathetic towards muscovite genocidaires.
Moscow's reach for the Black Sea had nothing to do with anti-slavery idealism or whatever you're getting at, they wanted ports and trade and didn't consider muslims as human as christians. It also seems to me that you don't consider serfdom a form of slavery, only international slave trade, which isn't a position I share.
And I'm not downplaying anything (and sure, the Russian Empire made justifications for what it did), I'm pointing out that my God - that was two centuries ago. By your measure, every modern American and Spaniard is a genocidal maniac...
Sure you are. You're bringing up excuses.
Antiquity ended at the dawn of medieval times. That's like half a millenium earlier than where you want to put it. 1863 is quite some distance into modernity, well into the age of the railroad.
I haven't made anything in this about individuals, rather centering it around Moscow, which has at times been sacked by mongols, crimean tatars and culturally dominated by Paris. But well yeah, the US is quite genocidal. So what? Do you consider it the golden standard of statecraft or something?
You are aware that Circassia is 3 countries and more than 4000km away from Tajikistan, right? And that the ethnicities involved in the Circassian genocides are wholly separated from Tajiks?
Russians are the ones who conducted actual genocides:
1. Ukrainian holodomor - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor
2. Kazakhstan famine - h ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazakh_famine_of_1930–1933
3. Genocide of Central Asian people in 1916 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Asian_revolt_of_1916
4. Chechen genocide over two centuries + 2 major wars - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chechen_genocide
5. Transnistria (Moldovan-Russia war) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transnistria_War
6. Russo-Georgian war - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Georgian_War
7. currently Russo-Ukrainian warRussia - is a failing imperial bloody state and Russians as a nation are bloody genocidal nation of maniacs.
Russia cannot exist in peaceful state, they always create and incite cnflicts and thrive on other peoples' misery and death
Russia has Cult of Death, they thrive, embrace, and preach for death
https://thehill.com/opinion/international/3864092-russias-cult-of-death/
https://maksymeristavi.substack.com/p/free-press-eristavi-russia-is-a-death
https://wavellroom.com/2024/05/14/the-russian-army-death-cult/
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/apathy-keeps-russias-death-cult-aliveThis wiki article has plenty of references, with many pointing to the racist actions by the senior officials https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_Russia
As an example: https://academic.oup.com/edinburgh-scholarship-online/book/2...
You have to lurk really hard to find a nationalist there unless you count people love Dostoyevsky into this group. There are also a lot of glass ceilings in place for ethnical Russians, and distribution in elite universities, politics, and business don’t represent the country average, which suggests there’s an intentional ’reverse racism’ in place towards majority. Moreover, the word ‘Russian’ is banned in media and is replaced by ‘citizen of Russia’.
I understand that people are unhappy with Russia right now, but what a truly gross thing to say (and absolutely not true).
Please add this to your reading list:
https://www.amazon.com/Creating-Russophobia-Religious-Anti-P...
"In a Levada Center poll, for instance, 45 percent of Russians said they had a positive attitude toward Jews in 2021, up from 22 percent in 2010. Russians said Jews were the minority group they were most comfortable having close to them — but only 11 percent said they’re ready to have a Jewish friend, up from 3 percent in 2010."
https://www.politico.eu/article/vladimir-putin-ukraine-war-f...
Nobody is denying that ru are humans, we are simply acknowledging that someone did very bad things against principles of humanity, did it deliberately, at scale, and over a very long time period.
same like zionist jews think of themselves as superior to palestinians, same russians think of themselves as superior to Ukrainians and other ex-soviet nations. BTW a lot of Israeli jews immigrated from Soviet Union and some could argue they could pick up this superiority complex from russians
And you have zero freaking clue what you are talking about. Are you Ukrainian by any chance?
Which has openly broken any established rules of war along with raping & genital mutilation being an actively encouraged tactic.
We?
Please, for your racist views speak for yourself, without 'royal we'.
Also people like you always conveniently omit anything what would show your people not as those saints as you try to portrait it.
Please watch these:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_xq7WcM_J0
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdtCCi249xE
Also, feel free to hit that translate button on videos like these, especially the top voted ones. The comment from Russians are generally very positive (even heartwarming) towards foreigners who are adequate, learn the language and follow the local laws.
Saying they are racist in that light is more like saying that relative to the average, they are a bit more racist than the best of us.
Russians were specifically targeted. A Russian TV reporter murdered on the street in broad daylight. A school bus evacuating families of Russian servicemen shot with an RPG. Churches destroyed and clergy killed.
You mean Russians that survived ethnic cleansing in the 90s?
"More than half the estimated 380,000 Russians in Tajikistan have fled since the violence began. Tajikistan has been criticized by the Amnesty International for human rights abuses against returning refugees (The AP, 05/25/93)." [0]
" the very blatant kleptocratic presidential family"
Who haven't let radical islamists turn Tajikistan into extremist's stronghold like Afghanistan after the USSR lost the war.
[0] https://webarchive.archive.unhcr.org/20230521232353/https://...
In this instance, a peculiar way to frame decolonisation.
Hiding genocides under the carpet because they are done by the former colony or satellite is not great.
First, we need to look at oil and gas pipeline maps from USSR to Europe. It's easy to do, we're on the internet after all. By pure coincidence, when prices of hydrocarbons had been at their lowest for years, budgets had become empty, and most parts of USSR had decided they need some political autonomy, leaders of three Socialist republics which were involved in extraction and delivery of resources had declared that USSR was no more:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belovezha_Accords
By doing that, they shook off the old men from the Party and other parts of Union government who had previously been above them, but became rulers without a country, and they also shook off sharing revenues with other Socialist republics, and supporting all USSR population. Enough of friendship of all Soviet nations!
Newspapers across the world called it “the victory of Democracy”, etc. Sure, the petrostate and two intermediate pieces of land under the pipes were full of debts, and planned to keep pumping valuable resources to the civilized world, so everything was fine.
Of course, honest and reliable bureaucrats and oligarchs ruling new countries mutually dependent on shared pipe system immediately started to argue whose balls were bigger, and tried to break any official agreement any time they felt like it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia%E2%80%93Ukraine_gas_dis...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belarus%E2%80%93Russia_relatio...
Partially it was because government budgets were empty in the '90s, and they had to became creative with money from the main source of income, partially it was because they fought for properties and energy supply for them, were selling industry piece by piece or seizing it. However, all was well as long as civilized world got their cheap oil and gas.
Even in Soviet times, southern Soviet republics were not that rich. Big industry was limited to isolated locations, and depended on exchange of goods and resources with other republics, and often factories were founded proprotionally according to state plans, not because something was logical. Agriculture was a neglected sector across all USSR in its late decades, and farm workers had very little opportunities, were generally poor, and sometimes grew crops no one needed (because distribution of food was also centralized, and US and Canada would sell as much grain as needed). Despite endless propaganda about workers and peasants, they were generally forgotten and ignored part of population. So-called “national specifics”, that is, corruption and nepotism, and remains of tribalism of pre-Soviet era, while not discussed openly until later years, also played a role. Therefore, life in agricultural regions was pretty drab. After the — forced — independence they were plunged into poverty.
Perestroika and economic turmoil uncovered national tensions (not just limited to “Russians go home”). Sure, a lot of people considered such far away places provincial shitholes, especially if they were sent to work there (in many cases, higher education resulted in government assignment that depended on your grades, loyalty, and family connections), and looked down upon locals. However, for a lot of other people the home was right there, sometimes for whole their lives. Of course, those who judged people by the color of their skin or facial features didn't bother with that. (Turns out that reading and even giving speeches about a single family of all nations does not make you friends with everyone, just like talking about colonial past does not make you any less of a white man in a cork hat.) While change of citizenship was offered to any ex-Soviet citizen (but still was not that easy), prices of property in southern republics were next to zero, and most savings disappeared, so many emigrants effectively became refugees relying on relatives and friends. That is, if they had prepared, and had not ran from a local mob.
By the way, it is widely accepted that Brighton Beach has the highest concentration of those vulgar Soviet hoi polloi on Earth, and the only place Soviet service can still exist. Obviously, future historians will agree that annexation of Brighton Beach was completely motivated and adequate move.
To conclude, Anglo-American self-chastising about colonial past can't be globally applied to each and every country as one-size-fit-all tool, just like the horrible bureaucratic concept of “race” (reminding a lot of people about Soviet “nationality” brand mark) does more harm than good outside of its native lands. Decolonial and postcolonial works from actual local researchers do exist, and they also mention that.
Good thing that I am not. I am just referring to the absolute non-dealing with the colonial past (or any past, or present) of Russia. After all, it's the last remaining European colonial empire.
Russian Federation still maintains freedom of travel with most of ex-Soviet republics. Good luck entering Britain without visa being a former colonial subject.
Wow.
* Deflecting actual questions
* Deeply chauvunistic remarks in line of "do they love their children"
Given this palette, I'm not really sure how to interact with you.
Either way, I've seen too many of either to have the energy to start all all the way at the beginning.
I am not yet senile, so I do remember that not so long ago everyone living on a stretch of land from Balkans to Bering Straight was a “Russian” with the same thick accent, no matter what they thought about that. That's the level of scientific discourse we're talking about. So current media-induced hyper-attentiveness to proper identification of characters on stage seems a bit hypocritical to me. As I said, there are people from “all those -stan countries lumped together because I'm too lazy to point my finger at any of them”, and also people from Russia who dissect actual dynamics of relationships in local societies instead of winging it with “ugh Soviet empire something something like African slave trade problem solved”.
Let's not forget there were multiple options to emigrate in early '90s. If you had at least some Russian family ties, you could try to flee to Russia. If you had at least some Jewish family ties, you could try to flee to Israel. If you had at least some German family ties, you could try to flee to Germany. Let's say we have twin sisters who were born in Tajikistan, and lived there. One decided to move to Russia (maybe because she had family and kids, and relatives on husband's side), other decided to move to Germany. Assuming they start at the same point in space and time, please tell me when one turns into colonialist, and the other into indirect victim of Soviet forced deportations?
Muskovite tradition is one of lies and deceit. You are struggling to understand things because you make the mistake of listening to words. Take a step back, get some actual historians books, and be enlightened. Continuing this exchange cannot be fruitful until you do.
We've had to ask you this more than once before:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31962578 (July 2022)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28322571 (Aug 2021)
We have to ban accounts that keep doing this, if you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.
I spent 2 years driving the length of the Pan-American Highway, and 3 years driving right around the African continent.
What you said can equally be applied to many places I spent a good deal of time in. Incredibly friendly, warm, kind and happy people to a degree I did not know was possible on planet earth. Sadly they're held down by corruption, ineptitude and the West.
Happily, virtually every single person laughs, sings, dances and celebrates basically everyday, because they choose to be vibrantly happy despite all the BS.
The problems are significantly of their own doing. I live in one such country (Nigeria), and many people say the same thing about my people- warm, friendly, and whatever.
But being warm and friendly doesn’t build a successful nation. Tribalism, high tolerance for corruption from the locals, and lack of the rule of law are what ruin these countries, and citizens are either too apathetic or outrightly support the same incompetent leaders ruining them.
Besides, some people are friendly to white foreigners but hostile to locals from another tribe.
My experience working as a vendor to a company that hired Zimworks out of Zimbabwe was rather underwhelming. Pastoral care was all they offered for healthcare to the local Zimbabwean employees, and the time shift the local employees endured seemed to wear heavily on them.
No, but kicking out the greedy WASPs and their lackeys and post-colonial infuence schemes does though - though seldom realized
This is the same mentality that contributes to these countries remaining poor. Just kick out the “WASPs”…so that the local kleptocrats take over.
The problem is corruption and lack of rule of law, not WASPs or whatever acronym can be used to blame foreigners instead of taking responsibility.
The "local kleptocrats" are usually just lackeys of those WASPs, put in place, supported financially and diplomatically, with arms and so on (and by pressuring their opponents) to ensure the stealing continues. On their own, they're small time crooks, the real bulk of the countries riches still goes back to the post-colonial masters...
>The problem is corruption and lack of rule of law, not WASPs
Corruption and lack of rule of law is a feature, not a bug. A feature kept in place by those bugs, the WASPs, with the help of loyal local scum.
"But, but, but those WASPS kept the rule of law an order when they governed directly as colonial masters"
Yeah, when you rule a colony and live there as ruler, it tends to benefit you to keep the rule of law. You get to stroll safe, and besides all your own colonial stealing is done "by the book" and is a-ok since it's based on your laws.
It's when you leave the place (or get kicked out) that you opt for the "divide and conquer" and "get friendly local scum to power" approaches, and helping keep the country poor, corrupt, and at war, pays dividends...
And you have your establishment scholars point out how it's the local's bad culture and unfitness for rule of law that prevents them for flourishing.
It's the same kind of people who would have written that the locals are inferior races and need taming and someone to keep them in order, a century or so ago...
The issue is not WASPs, it’s bad governance. But I guess life is easy when one can just blame WASPs rather than examine themselves to find fault.
We Africans have autonomy but refuse to use it for good. It’s condescending to assume we have no role in our problems and, to follow the logic, no role in the solutions.
Good governance can be learned and implemented within a short while. We Africans just refuse to.
Countries like Japan, never colonized, or China, only briefly and partially colonized, seem to recover way faster. I also don't think it's specifically an African thing: look at the Phillipines, or Pakistan, or large parts of the ME.
We should never push for change...it's the colonizer's fault always.
Sometimes it's important to recognize the history in order to push in the right direction. I don't know what the right direction is, but I think saying that Africans just suck because they've been dealt an awful hand seems unfair. I figure it's just really hard to get out from under the feet of an international system that was built for and by colonizers, and there are very few clearly good choices about how to do it.
I wonder how much of this is equivalent to small towns in the US passing laws to become speed traps. They get their revenue from out-of-towners passing through as the natural design speed of the highway instead of the posted limit. The difference is that police bribes go directly to the officer's pocket while speeding tickets get sent to the municipal budget, then allocated to the officer's salary.
I documented the whole enterprise here http://theroadchoseme.com/shipping-across-the-darien-gap-pt-...
what?
Have you ever wondered why all those poor countries around the world sell unprocessed coffee to Switzerland for pennies rather than telling Switzerland to take a hike, processing it themselves and making way more money?
Have you ever wondered why many very poor countries around the world sell their raw minerals for a tiny fraction of the globally accepted price?
After three years on the ground in Africa, my eyes were very wide open. The multi-billion dollar loans from the IMF and World Bank have these countries over a barrel, and if they try to change the status quo, they will be sent back to the dark ages instantly. Spending time in Sudan was very educational, though it means I can never get a visa-wavier for the US. Why do you think that is? (Hint: gas in Sudan was 6 cents a liter..., diesel was half that)
Also very educational to try at get a visa for Ecuatorial Guninea (it has a TON of oil, and a TON of multi-national companies ripping it out). A foreigner can go to the island where the capital is no problem, but try getting permission to go to the mainland - you can't. Even with a valid visa you can't get in. (I camped in view of it here [2] )
Why? Because they don't want you to see what is happening there.
[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1096413/main-export-coun...
because it makes economic sense to do that.
but you can act locally, why do you buy clothing instead of knitting your own, and then with your spare time milling your own flour?
Setting up a factory costs a lot of money, and almost no one is willing to make long-term investments in a corrupt and unstable country.
> The multi-billion dollar loans from the IMF and World Bank have these countries over a barrel, and if they try to change the status quo, they will be sent back to the dark ages instantly.
Botswana, the best-governed country in Africa, has managed its economy well enough to never need an IMF bailout. Meanwhile, Ghana has gone begging for IMF bailouts 17 times [1]. If the Ghanaian leaders (voted in by citizens) weren't perpetually inept, the country wouldn't constantly go to the IMF with begging plates.
> Spending time in Sudan was very educational, though it means I can never get a visa-wavier for the US. Why do you think that is? (Hint: gas in Sudan was 6 cents a liter..., diesel was half that)
Sudan had a murderous dictator who reigned for three decades. He was toppled, but it didn't take long for the country to fall into a current bloody civil war.
> A foreigner can go to the island where the capital is no problem, but try getting permission to go to the mainland - you can't. Even with a valid visa you can't get in. (I camped in view of it here [2] )
Because Equitoreal Guinea is run by a comical dictator who lives lavishly while most of his citizens live in penury. Of course, he doesn't want foreigners to see the mess he oversees.
As an African (Nigerian to be specific), I'm actually tired of foreigners always finding excuses for our problems. It's condescending to assume we have no agency, and everything bad that happens to us is the fault of some foreign boogeymen.
1- https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/business/Year-in-Revi....